It is a fact that the Holocaust occurred

The Mazal Library

Essays

Photographs documenting the Holocaust in Hungary

László Karsai Ph.D.

Introduction by Harry W. Mazal OBE

When the Soviet Army captured Budapest on January 17-18, 1945, it was too late to save the lives of 564,500 Jews who had been sent to the various death-camps run by the Nazis. The Budapest SS headquarters, however, was over-run by the Soviets before the Nazis were able to destroy a huge number of papers which documented their efforts to annihilate the Hungarian Jews. These documents, together with many of the photographs that are part of this essay, were bundled up by the Soviets and stored in the basement of the Hungarian Ministry of the Interior where they remained unseen for over forty years. When Hungary regained its independence from the Soviet block, the new Minister of the Interior discovered these documents and gave them to the Jewish Museum and Archives of Hungary where Dr. Karsai is presently cataloging and scanning them. We are pleased that the Museum has selected The Holocaust History Project as the site in the United States where eventually all of the tens of thousands of documents may be viewed. The small sampling shown below bears witness to those dreadful years. [08/01/99 — HWM]

Many people know — although many of them very much want to forget, and still many want to make others forget — that the Nazis and their European accomplices murdered six million Jews by employing various methods, such as hunger, beating, hanging, shooting, gassing, etc. during the Second Word War. Nearly one tenth of the victims were Hungarian Jews, which means approximately 550,000 people. This estimate is based on a sound research of archival documents.

Even the definition is strange: a "Hungarian Jew." A major element constituting the tragedy of the Jews in Hungary was that those people who after their Emancipation (1867) became unreservedly Hungarians regarding their language, customs, clothing, and most importantly, their feelings, were excluded from the community of Hungarian citizens. Horthy Miklós’s regime (1920-1944) carried out their gradual exclusion by a series of Jewish Laws passed after 1938. Those very same Jews, about whom Theodor Herzl stated with resignation at the turn of the century that they became a "dry bough" of Zionism, suddenly realized that their homeland for which they had fought with such devotion during the First World War (more than 10,000 Jews died and thousands upon thousands were wounded and disabled) regards them as alien enemies. This was the case in spite of the fact that the overwhelming majority of the Hungarian Jewry, notwithstanding the orthodoxim, regarded themselves as Hungarians following the "faith of Moses."

The reasons why the Hungarian Parliament agreed to pass the severely unlawful First Jewish Law is a subject of a historical debate. According to the traditional opinion it was meant to be a token of "good" intentions towards Hitler’s Reich, the neighbor of which Hungary became after the Anschluss (The Nazi Third Reich annexed Austria in March 1938). It is also possible that the right-wing conservative politicians aimed to take the wind out of the sails of the extreme right. It may well be that the example of the fascist Italy also exercised a considerable influence, since Mussolini in the same year passed anti-Semite laws and decrees, with which he surprised even the members of his own party.

Three anti-Semite laws completed the exclusion of the Hungarian Jews between 1938 and 1941. The first two laws made their economic situation more and more difficult, the Third Jewish Law, which was passed in 1941, however, was a real, Nuremberg-type, racial law introducing "race-protective" orders.

In July and August of 1941 nearly 16,000 Jews regarded as aliens or whose citizenship was stated to be unresolved, were deported to territories under German rule in Galicia where the Germans massacred them in the vicinity of Kamenec-Podolskij. This was the first "five-digit massacre" during the process of the Holocaust of the European Jewry. We do not have photos documenting this massacre. However, we have pictures about the second massacre which involved Hungarian Jews. In January 1942 in the Southern region (Délvidék, which was reclaimed from Yugoslavia) during an action taken against Serb partisans Hungarian gendarmeries murdered nearly 3,500 people. There were about 800 Jews among them. The gendarmeries shot their victims and threw their bodies into holes blown in the ice of the frozen over Danube. Evidently, in order to frighten the civilians, they also hanged people in the public squares as we can see in the pictures.

Eichmann and his Sonderkommando of 200 men deported the Jews of the provinces to Auschwitz with the active help of the Hungarian clerks, policemen, solders and gendarmeries in the spring and early summer of 1944. The Jewry of the provinces, 437,000 people, made up more than fifty percent of the entire Hungarian Jewry. We have extremely few photos documenting this horrible "record achievement," since Eichmann and his "experts" were not "able" to deport so many Jews in such a short period from any other European country (between May 15 and June 6 of 1944).

According to archival documents, sporadic newspaper sources, and testimonies of survivors, the majority of the gentiles did not even try to help the persecuted people. There were only few people who participated actively in the persecution besides the officials and functionaries. Their estimated number is greater, however, than the number of those people who tried to help actively. The photos documenting the deportation show that it takes only a few gendarmeries to march the obedient Jews to the railway station, to the cattle cars. We know from archival documents that after the deportation, the citizens began the looting of the deserted ghettos. In some places they acted defying the martial law; and in other places they had official permission. Obviously, the looters of Kôszeg belonged to the second category, since they happily allowed the taking of pictures. Both the looters and the loot indicate, that in this case, poor people were taking the belongings of other poor people.

Miklós Horthy put an end to the deportation of the Jews on the 6th of July, 1944. The reasons are still not entirely clear. It is possible that his decision was motivated by the landing of the allied forces on the shores of Normandy, or the offensive of the Red Army, or he was afraid that the capital would have been destroyed by a carpet bombing if the Jews of Pest had had been deported. Eichmann had a fit, but without Hungarian help he was not able to continue shipping "raw material" to the death factory of Auschwitz.

Ferenc Szálasi, the leader of the Arrow-Cross Party and the Hungarist Movement came to power with the help of the Germans, after Miklós Horthy, the governor of Hungary, announced that he appealed for cease-fire. The members of his government, when their picture was taken, broke a tradition: they did not wear their Hungarian gala-dress. They put on simple civilian clothes. Maybe they had a premonition concerning their fate: the majority of them would be sentenced to death by the court of the Hungarian People within a period less than one and a half years.

Nearly 200,000 Jews were terrified in Budapest by the coming into power of Szálasi’s Arrow-Cross men. The troops of the Red Army were not able to liberate the ghetto of Pest until the 18th of January, 1945. Up to then, hundreds of defenseless Jews were murdered by Arrow-Cross men every day as the photos show. Many Jews were tortured horribly before their death, others were simply shot and thrown into the Danube which was filled with drift-ice. They handed over nearly 70,000 Jews to the Germans for forced labor. They worked on the fortification system in the Sub-Alps in order to "protect" Vienna.

In the spring of 1945 Budapest was reduced to ruins as we can see in the photographs. Because of the meaningless war fought on the Nazi’s side nearly one million lives were lost. From 825,000 Hungarian Jews 550,000 died, and some of the returning survivors emigrated within the next few years. Thus, in the place where one of the most flourishing Jewish communities of Middle-Eastern Europe once existed, now only approximately 5,000-70,000 Jews exist.

01-0418	Interned lawyers, actors and journalists
01-0419	Intellectuals in the internment camp. Written on the picture: Some of the last Jewish members of the editorial staff of the "Pesti Hírlap," who were working until the great change, and then they landed in the factory internment camp. From left to right: Imre Gyôri, the former editor of the paper, Gyula Vidor former political columnist, Béla Szabó, János Fleiner Fóti, the former "dreaded" critic, Lajos Réti, the younger brother of Katalin Karádi’s secretary, László Gál, the son of the actor Gyula Gál, and Ferenc Kemény political contributor.
01-0420	Jewish intellectuals in the internment camp.
01-0421	Internment camp. Written on the picture: "Some of the last Jewish 'Mochikans' of the Pester Lloyd in the factory internment camp." From left to right: 1. Ernô Geiringer, 2. György Kecskeméti, 3. István Keller, 4. Péter Sugár, 5. Gyula Morgernstern, Jewish former journalists.
01-0422	Members of the editorial team of the newspaper "Esti Kurir" in the internment camp (István Kardos was murdered).
01-0423	Internment camp. Written on the picture: "The last Jewish members of the editorial staff of the 'Ujság' in the factory internment camp." From left to right: Zoltán Stób, Sándor Jemnitz, Ernô Halász, Géza Kônig, Endre György, Jenô Nádor.
01-0424	Internment camp. "The illustrious quartet (four-in-hand)." [written on the picture] — the first man from the left is Mr. Rozsnyai the composer. He does not wear the yellow star because his wife is Christian. It did not help, however: he and his wife were murdered.
01-0425	Ernô Ligeti was murdered. Written on the picture: "Ernô Ligeti Lichtenstein, the former Jewish journalist and novelist in the factory internment camp."
01-0426	An article in the "Harc" about the Jews in the internment camp. (Title: "Together the Entire Illustrious Company!")
01-0427	Leaders of banks and factories in the internment camp. Written on the picture: "These 'big Jews' also live in the internment camp: 1. Baron Samu Madarassy-Beck, the retired president of Leszámítoló Bank. 2. Emil Wolf, the former manager of the Chinoin chemical factory, who do not wear the yellow star even in the internment camp for Jews, because his wife is Christian. 3. Samu Weiner, the former 'leader' of the Jewish mill industry. 4. Károly Somogyi, the former co-owner of the Haasz and Somogyi hardware company."
01-0429	From the newspaper "Harc." The text written on the picture is abusive and sarcastic in the vein of anti-Semitic writing.
01-0430	Internment camp. Written on the picture: "Jewish women lying down in the factory internment camp."
01-0431	Distribution of dinner in the internment camp.
01-0432	Internment camp. A group in the internment camp. In the front stands Zoli, the famous dwarf clown of Budapest.
01-0433	Internment camp.
01-0698	Dezsô Kellér, the famous master of ceremonies in forced labor. None of the listeners seen in this picture survived (Nyírség, 1943).
01-0699	60 tortured corpses of Jewish forced laborers killed by the Nazis in the Beregi forest at Füzesabony (8 November 1944).
01-1060	Scenes from the life of Jewish forced laborers: a tableau (Riptinyec, 1940).
01-1061	Scenes from the life of Jewish forced laborers: construction work (Riptinyec, 1940).
01-1062	Scenes from the life of Jewish forced laborers: the skeleton staff (Riptinyec, 1940).
01-1063	Scenes from the life of Jewish forced laborers: cooks: J. Szitnyai (Riptinyec, 1940).
01-1067	Scenes from the life of Jewish forced laborers: on the way to Russia (Riptinyec, 1940).
01-1068	Scenes from the life of Jewish forced laborers: the entire forced labor battalion (Riptinyec, 1940).
01-1069	Scenes from the life of Jewish forced laborers: construction work (Riptinyec, 1940).
01-1070	Scenes from the life of Jewish forced laborers: on the way to Russia (Riptinyec, 1940).
01-1071	Scenes from the life of Jewish forced laborers: one of the officers (Riptinyec, 1940).
01-1072	Scenes from the life of Jewish forced laborers: the same officer (Riptinyec, 1940).
01-1073	Scenes from the life of Jewish forced laborers: working on road construction (Riptinyec, 1940).
01-1074	Scenes from the life of Jewish forced laborers: working on road construction (Riptinyec, 1940).
01-1075	Scenes from the life of Jewish forced laborers: shoemakers (Riptinyec, 1940).
01-1076	Scenes from the life of Jewish forced laborers: a tableau (Riptinyec, 1940).
01-1077	Scenes from the life of Jewish forced laborers: kitchen (Riptinyec, 1940).
01-1078	Scenes from the life of Jewish forced laborers: camp fire (Riptinyec, 1940).
01-1079	Scenes from the life of Jewish forced laborers: a tableau (Riptinyec, 1940).
01-1080	Scenes from the life of Jewish forced laborers: a tableau (Riptinyec, 1940).
01-1081	Scenes from the life of Jewish forced laborers: part of the camp (Riptinyec, 1940).
01-1082	Scenes from the life of Jewish forced laborers: working on road construction (Riptinyec, 1940).
01-1083	Scenes from the life of Jewish forced laborers: staff of officers (Riptinyec, 1940).
02-0428	Ohrolruf camp.
03-0464	The center of the Arrow Cross Party at Andrássy street No. 60: "the House of Fidelity."
03-0465	The center of the Arrow Cross Party under Andrássy street No. 60: "the House of Fidelity." (partial enlargement of 03-0464)
03-0484	The Arrow Cross Government (Ferenc Szálasi was the Prime Minister).
03-0485	The Szálasi Government.
03-0486	Ferenc Szálasi enters the Castle of Buda.
03-1122	Strolling people.
04-0496	The gate of a house at Kossuth Lajos Square no. 18 is marked by a yellow star.
04-0497	A Jewish woman clearing away rubble.
04-0503	Moving into a house marked by a yellow star.
04-0504	Jews being marched on the József ring (József körút) to the ghetto of Pest.
04-702	Handcuffing in Poland.
04-705	Many Jews who wanted to obtain a Schutzpass are queuing in front of the so called "Glass House" (Budapest, Vadász street no. 29.) which was protected by the Swiss embassy.
04-707	School of Jewish children, refugees from Poland in Vác (1942-1943).
04-718	The synagogue of Tarnopol which was set on fire by the Nazis.
04-719	Before being taken away.
04-720	Yellow star.
04-1049	A rabbi is forced to wash a car (Novy Sad, 1942).
05-0507	Jewish victims of Arrow Cross men — A mass of corpses in Budapest.
05-0508	Jewish victims of Arrow Cross men.
05-0511	Jewish victims of Arrow Cross men — A mass of corpses in Budapest.
05-0512	Jewish victims of Arrow Cross men — A mass of corpses.
05-0513	Jewish victims of Arrow Cross men — A mass of corpses in Budapest.
05-0514	Jewish victims of Arrow Cross men — A mass of corpses.
05-0515	Jewish victims of Arrow Cross men — A mass of corpses in Budapest.
05-0516	Jewish victim of Arrow Cross men in Budapest.
05-0517	Jewish victims of Arrow Cross men — A mass of corpses.
05-0518	Jewish victims of Arrow Cross men — A mass of corpses.
05-0519	Jewish victim of Arrow Cross men in Budapest.
05-0519a	Jewish victim of Arrow Cross men.
05-0520	Jewish victims of Arrow Cross men — A mass of corpses in Budapest.
05-0521	The skull of a victim of Arrow Cross men.
05-0522	Jewish victims of Arrow Cross men.
05-0523	Jewish victims of Arrow Cross men.
05-0524	Jewish victims of Arrow Cross men — A mass of corpses.
05-0525	Jewish victims of Arrow Cross men — A mass of corpses.
05-0526	Jewish victims of Arrow Cross men — A mass of corpses.
05-0527	Jewish victims of Arrow Cross men in the court of the Synagogue of Dohány street.
05-0699	Corpses in a concentration camp.
05-0700	Corpses in a concentration camp.
05-0701	The death of a Jewish forced laborer.
05-0711	Novy Sad, a street after shooting committed by the gendarmerie.
05-0712	Hungarian gendarmes are shooting Jews on the streets in Novy Sad.
05-1048	Executions in Novy Sad in 1942.
05-1050	Executed Jews in the Southern region (Délvidék) in 1942.
05-1051	Executed Jews in the Southern region (Délvidék) in 1942.
05-1052	Executed Jews in the Southern region (Délvidék) in 1942.
05-1053	Hanged Jews in the Southern region (Délvidék) in 1942.
05-1054	Hanged Jews in the Southern region (Délvidék) in 1942.
05-1056	Hanged Jews in the Southern region (Délvidék) in 1942.
05-1057	Hanged Jews in the Southern region (Délvidék) in 1942.
05-1058	Hanging (Novy Sad, 1942)
05-1059	Executed Jews in the Southern region (Délvidék) in 1942.
05-1117	Victims of the ghetto (Budapest, 19 January 1945).
05-1118	A victim of the Arrow Cross men (Budapest, 1944).
05-1128	Victims of Arrow Cross men (Budapest, 1944)
05-1129	A cart full of corpses (Budapest, 1945)
05-1130	Wagon full of corpses (Budapest, 1945)
05-1131	Victims of Arrow Cross men (Budapest, 1944-1945)
05-1132	Victims of Arrow Cross men (Budapest, 1944-1945)
05-1157	Murdered Jewish forced laborers at the end of 1944 in the Beregi forest at Füzesabony.
06-0696	Exhumation of the bodies of Jewish forced laborers at Cservenka (November 5, 1957)
06-0697	A group of objects found during the exhumation at Cservenka (November 5, 1957).
06-0703	The identification of the corpse of 22 year old Magda Friedmann in Budapest.
06-0708	The grave-stone of Hanna Szenes in Budapest.
06-1043	Patients and doctors murdered in the Jewish hospital in Maros street (Budapest, 1945).
06-1044	Corpse of a murdered Jew.
06-1089	Funeral procession held for exhumed bodies of Jewish forced laborers (Budapest).
06-1090a	Exhumation from the depth of 60 cm in the forest of Kerecsend.
06-1091	Exhumation in the forest of Kerecsend
06-1092	A corpse in a coffin in the forest of Kerecsend.
06-1094	Re-examination: dr. Németh and his colleague (in the forest of Kerecsend).
06-1095	Exhumed corpse in the forest of Kerecsend.
06-1097a	Corpses of a mother and her daughter in the forest of Kerecsend.
06-1099	Taking 20 corpses to the cemetery of Eger from the forest of Kerecsend.
06-1100a	Coffins on the hill of the cemetery after the exhumation (Kerecsend).
06-1101	12 corpses in coffins (Kerecsend).
06-1102	The lowering of the coffins to the grave (Eger).
06-1103	The funeral of the 26 martyrs in Eger. They were murdered in the forest of Kerecsend. Mr. Székely the President of the Jewish Community of Eger delivers a speech.
06-1104	The funeral of the 26 martyrs in Eger. They were murdered in the forest of Kerecsend.
06-1110	Tank, refugees
06-1111	Street in the time of war.
06-1116	Taking photos of the victims in the ghetto (Budapest, 19. January 1945).
06-1124	Prisoners of war
07-0553	Portrait of a victim of skin transplantation.
07-0716	Shoe sole made of a desecrated Torah.
07-0717	Drum made from a desecrated Torah.
08-0641	The emptying of apartments of Jews in Sopron (1944).
08-0645	Deportation of the Jewry of the provinces in Kôszeg (1944).
08-0646	Deportation of the Jewry of the provinces in Kôszeg (1944).
08-0647	Jews marching towards the railway station in Kôszeg (1944).
08-0648	March of deportees to the railway station in Kôszeg (1944).
08-0649	Deportation of the Jewry of the provinces in Kôszeg (1944).
08-0650	Deportation of the Jewry of the provinces in Kôszeg (1944).
08-0651	A hiding Jew.
08-0680	Looting of the deserted ghetto in the provinces.
08-0681	Looting of the deserted ghetto in the provinces.
08-0682	Looting of the deserted ghetto in the provinces.
08-0683	Looting of the deserted ghetto in the provinces.
08-0686	Looting of the deserted ghetto in the provinces.
08-0687	Looting of the deserted ghetto in the provinces.
08-0688	Looting of the deserted ghetto in the provinces.
08-0690	Looting of the deserted ghetto in the provinces.
08-0691	Looting of the deserted ghetto in the provinces.
08-0721	A ravaged home.
08-0994	March of deportees on the streets of Kôszeg in 1944.
08-0995	March of deportees on the streets of Kôszeg in 1944.
08-0996	March of deportees on the streets of Kôszeg in 1944.
08-0997	March of deportees on the streets of Kôszeg in 1944.
08-0998	March of deportees on the streets of Kôszeg in 1944.
08-0999	March of deportees on the streets of Kôszeg in 1944.
08-1000	March of deportees on the streets of Kôszeg in 1944.
08-1001	Deportation: on the way to the railway station (Kôszeg, 1944).
08-1046	Deportation (Balatonfüred, 1944).
08-1047	Deportation (Balatonfüred, 1944).
08-1108	Arrival at the concentration camp.
08-1109	Part of the camp.
08-1119	Goldmark Hall (Budapest, 1945).
09-0713	Picture taken in Germany [?]
09-0714	The humiliating march of those who "dishonored the German race".
09-0715	Placard against Jewish lawyers and doctors.
10-1037	A deportee (Auschwitz).
10-1038	Arrival at Auschwitz (1944).
10-1039	A group of people arriving at Auschwitz (1944).
10-1105	Medical experiment.
10-1112	A small child with tattooed arm.
10-1125	People lined up to celebrate in a camp after the Second World War.
10-1126	Wreaths for the memory of the martyrs.
11-1106	Shooting in the back of the neck.
11-1107	SS execution.
11-1113	Victim in a concentration camp.
11-1127	Heap of corpses.
12-1135	A dead person beside the rails.
12-1136	Corpses in Dachau.
12-1137	Interior of a barrack (Dachau).
12-1138	Heap of corpses in Dachau.
12-1139	Corpses in Dachau.
12-1140	Corpses in Dachau.
12-1141	Victims in Dachau.
12-1142	Victims in Dachau.